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55th Congress, ) SENATE. ( Document 

2d Session, ) \ No. 102. 



THE HISTOEIC POLICY OF THE UNITED STATES AS TO 

ANNEXATION. 



January 31. 1898.— Ordered to be printed. 



Mr. iMoRdAN presented the iollowiug: 

THE HISTORIC POLICY OF THE UNITED STATES AS TO ANNEX- 
ATION.— BY PROF. SIMEON E. BALDWIN, LL. D.. OF YALE UNI- 
VERSITY. 



Tlie United States, according^ to President Lincoln, was '-formed in 
fact by the Articles of Associatioji in 1774." Bnt the self styled -'Conti- 
nental Congress," which framed those articles, represented and claimed 
to represent bnt a small portion of the American Continent. The eleven 
colonies wlio.se <lelegate.s met at Cari)enter.s' Hall October 20, 1774, and 
those of the three counties of Delaware who sat with them on equal 
terms, though really a part of the i^roprietary government of Pennsyl- 
vania, were in actual possession of but a narrow strip of territory on 
the Atlantic seaboard, running back no further than the line of the 
Alleghanies. To the southward lay Ceorgia, East Florida, West Flor- 
ida, and Louisiana; to the northward Nova Scotia and Canada; and 
on their western Irontiers Parliament had recently put the boundary of 
the new Province of Quebec. 

It was the hope of Congress that their ranks might be swelled by 
the accession of all the British colonies or provinces on our continent. 
On October 26 a stirring appeal to unite in the Articles of Association, 
adopted two days before, was addressed to the inhabitants of Quebec. 
" We defy you," wrote Congress, "casting your view upon every side, 
to discover a single circumstance promising from any quarter the faint- 
est hope of liberty to you or your posterity but from an entire adoption 
into the Union of these colonies." * * * "What," it was urged, "would 
your great countryman, Montesquieu, say to you, were he living to-day? 
Would not this be the purport of his address? Seize the opportu- 
nity presented to you by Providence itself. You have been conquered 
into liberty, if you act as you ought. This work is not of man. You 
are a small people compared to those who, with open arms, invite you 
into a fellowship. A moment's reflection should convince you which 
will be most for your interest and happiness — to have all the rest of 
North America your unalterable friends or your inveterate enemies. 
The injuries of Boston have roused and associated every colony from 
Nova Scotia to Georgia. Your province is the only link wanting to 
complete the bright and strong chain of union. Nature has joined your 
country to theirs. Do you join your political interests." * * * a^g, 
are too well acquainted with the liberality of sentiment distinguishing 
your nation to imagine that difference of religion will prejudice you 
against a hearty amity with us. )Ypu know that the transcendent nature 



2 POLICY OF THE UNITED STATES AS TO ANNEXATION. 

of freedom elevates those who unite in her cause above all such low- 
miuded infirmities."* 

The adilress concluded with the recommendation that they should 
choose a provincial congress, which might send delegates to the next 
Continental Cougress to be held at Philadelphia in May, 1775, and 
formally accede to the existing confederation, so that, in resisting future 
aggressions, they might rely no longer on the small influence of a single 
province, "but on the consolidated ])owers of North America." 

The Annual Register for 1775 truly says that, " of all the papers 
published by the American Congress, their address to the French 
inhabitants of Canada discovered the most dextrous management and 
the most able method of application to the temper and passions of the 
parties whom they endeavored to gain."t 

A corresi^ondence with Canadian patriots was also begun by the 
Massachusetts committee of safety, and Samuel Adams was particularly 
earnest in his efforts to gain their support. 

lu Mav, 1775, another address to the inhabitants of Canada was 
adopted by Congress, from the i)eu of Jay. It declared that " the fate 
of the Protestant and Catholic colonies was strongly linked together," 
and that Congress yet entertained hopes of a union with them in 
the defense of their common liberty. t 

During- the session of this Congress an address from the inhabitants 
of several parishes in Bermuda was received, and a Canadian once 
appeared upon the floor. In November the inhabitants of a district in 
Nova Scotia, which had elected a committee of safety, applied lor admis- 
sionin to "the Association of the United Colonies." § 

The proceedings of this Congress have come down to us in a very 
unsatisfactorv state, owing to the fact that it was not deemed safe to 
print in the official journals all that was done. After forty years a large 
part of what was originally sui)pressed was published by the Govern- 
ment under the style of the Secret Journals of Congress, but no attempt 
was made to combine the two records or to supply an index to the 
whole. 

In July, 1775, Dr. Franklin brought forward a plan, which had appar- 
ently been drawn up for submission in May, for "Articles of confedera- 
tion and perpetual union" between "the United Colonies of North 
America." They provided for the accession of all the other British 
colonies on the' continent— that is, (^)uebec, St. Johns. Nova Scotia, 
East and West Florida, and the Bermuda Islands. || Notwithstanding 
the care taken to suppress this proceeding, a copy of the paper got 
across the ocean and was printed in full in the Annual Register for 1775.1] 

In the latter part of this year Congress dispatched agents to Canada 
and others to Nova Scotia to inquire particularly into the disposition of 
their inhabitants respecting a union of interests with the more southern 
colonies. The assembly of Jamaica had sent in a memorial to the King 
in council which, while' disclaiming any thought of forcible resistance, 
set up the claims of their inhabitants to self-government in language 
nearly as strong as that used by the Continental Congress.** The latter 
body responded in an address to the assembly of Jamaica thanking 

* 1, Journals of Congress, 64. 
f History of Europe. 32. 
1 1, Journals of Conjrress, 109. 
»!i 1, Jouruals of Congress, 230, 244. 
II I, Secret Joiinuils of Congress, 283. 
11 State Papers, 252. 
** Ajinual Kegister for 1775; I] \t. of Europe, 101. 



POLICY OF THE UNITED STATES AS TO ANNEXATION. 3 

them for their sympathy, and saying that while "the peculiar situation 
of your island forbids your assistance," they were glad, at least, to have 
their good wishes. 

Soon afterward three commissioners were appointed to repair to the 
northern frontier and endeavor "to induce the Canadians to accede to 
a union with these colonies," and to send delegates to Congress.* The 
commissioners were authorized to pledge them "the free enjoyment of 
their religion,"! and to raise, if possible, a Canadian regiment for the 
Continental Army. 

A few men did enlist, and such accessions were received from time to 
time that at last a Canadian regiment was organized and officered and 
a second one projected, t 

Early in 1776 another set of commissioners, headed by Franklin, were 
dispatched directly to Canada on a similar errand, bearing addresses 
from Congress which were printed in French and English and circu- 
lated extensively among the people. § The instructions of the commis- 
sioners were to assure the Canadians that their interests and ours were 
inseparably united, and to urge them to join us as a "sister colony." 

Xo impression seemed to be made by the addresses, and it was soon 
discovered that quite an adequate reason existed in the fact that not 
one out of live hundred of the popuhition could read. Dr. Franklin, on 
his return, said that if it were ever thought best to send another mission, 
it should be one composed of schoolmasters. With a few of the leaders 
there Franklin had better success, and during a fortnight something 
like a provisional government was set up under his auspices, which, 
however, melted into thin air (m the approach of British troops. j| 

In June, 1770, Congress sent two ships to the Bermudas with pro- 
visions, to relieve the distress caused by our nonimportation association, 
and with directions to inquire into the disposition of the inhabitants 
respecting a union of interests with ours.^ 

It is probable that the report was not encouraging, for when in July, 
1776, Franklin's scheme for confederation was reported on by the com- 
mittee which had had it under consideration for a year, the provision 
for bringing in the other English colonies was struck out, except so far 
as related to Canada. 8he was to have the right to admission on 
request, but no other colony was to be admitted without the consent of 
nine States.** 

Provision was made by Congress as soon as these articles were agreed 
on and sent out to the States for ratification (jSTovember 29, 1777) for 
having them translated into French and circulated among the Cana- 
dians, with an invitation "to accede to the union of these States." ft 

Our invasions of their territory, however, and their ill success, had 
left little of the spirit of united resistance to British authority. Had 
the Declaration of Independence been made as early as the more fiery 
patriots would have had it, it is not impossible that Canada and Nova 
Scotia would have been swept into the current. Samuel Adams wrote 
in July, 1776, to a friend, that had it come in 1775, Canada, in his 

* Washington strongly urged this course in his letters from cauip. Writings, 
Sparks' ed., iii, 173. 

I I, Journals of Congress, 242. 

t Writings of Washington, Sparks' ed., iv, 267. 
^ 1, Secret Journals of ("ongress, 42. 

II I, Journals of Congress, 305. 

5r 1, Secret Journals of Congress, 46. 

**1, Secret Journals of Congress, 290; Annual Register for 1776; State Papers, p. 269. 
tt 2 Secret Journals of Congress, 54. 



4 POLICY OF THE UNITED STATES AS TO ANXEa.. fs. 

opinion, "would at this time Lave been one of the United Colonies."* 
In the fall of 1776, Franklin, then about to sail on his European mis- 
sion, snbmitted to the secret committee of Congress his scheme for 
proposals of i)eace. These were that Great Britain should acknowl- 
edge our independence and sell us Quebec, St. Johns, Nova Scotia, 
Bermuda, East and West Florida, and the Bahamas. In addition to 
payment of the i)urchase money, we were to grant free trade to all 
British subjects and guarantee to Great Britain her West India Islands. 
In the pa])er explaining this scheme Franklin states that as to the 
colonies to be purchased " it is absolutely necessary for us to have them 
for our own security." t 

In letters to English friends while in France he expressed similar 
views, saying tluit discord would continually arise on the frontiers 
unless peace were cemented by the cession of Canadn, Nova Scotia, 

and the Floridas.l 

John Adams entertained opinions of the same kind. In April, 178L', 
while in Holhind. he was advised by Henry Laurens, one of our foreign 
commissioners who had been captured by a F>ritish man of war and put 
in the Tower on a charge of treason, but was now at large on parole, 
that many of the opposition in England favored the surrender of 
Canada and Nova Scotia. Mr. Adams replied that lie feared that we 
could never have real peace with Canachi or Nova Scotia in the hands 
of the English, and that at least we should stipulate in any treaty of 
peace that they should keep no troops or fortified places on the frontiers 
of either.^ 

A few days later Dr. Franklin submitted to Mr. Oswald, with whom, 
as the commissioner of Great Britain, the treaty of i)eace was after- 
ward negotiated, a paper suggesting the dangers of maintaining a 
long frontier between countries, the roughest of whose people would 
always inhal)it their borders and outposts, and that Great Britain 
might well cede Canada to us on condition of a peri)etual guaranty of 
free trade with that province and a provision for indemnity for the 
losses, both of Canadian loyalists and of Americans whose property had 
been burned in British invasions, out of the proceeds of sales of the 
public lands remaining ungranted.|| 

The influence of France was from the tirst thrown against the enlarge- 
ment of the United States by the accession of any more of the British 
colonies. As most of these had once been hers, she doubtless hoped 
that thev might some day become again part of their mother country. 
Our treaty with her, of 1778, stii)ulated that should she capture any 
of the British West India islands it should be for her own benefit, 
while if we should occupy the northern colonies or the Bermudas they 
should " be confederate with or dependent upon the said United States." 

The adoption of the present Constitution of the United States, in 
abrogating by the voice of the majority the Articles of Confederation, 
was a revolutionary proceeding which threw two States out of the 
Union. North Carolina and Ehode Island, by refusing to ratify the 
work of the convention of 1787, put themselves for a time certainly 
very near the position of foreign States. This conseipience of their 
action was strongly urged in the North Carolina convention. "In my 

" Life of Saninel Adams, il, 434. 
t Franklin's Works, i. 143. 
{Ibid., I, 311. 

vN See Washington's letter to Landon Carter of May 30. 1778, to tlie same effect. 
Writings, Sparks' ed., V, 389. 
II Franklin's Work's, i, 480. 



POLICY OF THE UNITED STATES AS TO ANNEXATION. 5 

opinion," said (ioveriior Jolmston, one of its members, "if we refuse to 
ratify tlie Constitutiou we shall be entirely out of tlie Union, and can 
be considered only as a foreign ])ower. It is true the United States 
may admit us hereafter, but they may admit us on terms uiieijual and 
disadvantageous to us/' " It is objected," replied the next sjieaker, " we 
shall be out of the Union. So I wish to be. We are left at liberty to 
come in at any time."* " In my opinion." said James Iredell, afterwards 
a Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, "when any State 
has once rejected the Constitution it can not claim to come in after- 
wards as a matter of right. If it does not in plain terms reject, but 
refuses to accede for the present, I think the other States may regard 
this as an absolute rejection and refuse to admit us afterwards, but at 
their pleasure and on what terms they please." t 

When, however, in 1780 and 1790 these States reluctantly sent in 
their ratifications, no question was made about receiving them on equal 
terms with those by which the new Government had been originally 
organized; and they came in on a footing of right. 

The United States of 178!) were in many respects a political combi- 
nation of foreign communities. The Atlantic was almost the sole means 
of communication between the Northern and Southern States. The 
Hudson helped to bind eastern New England to New York. The Ohio 
and the Mississipi)i might lead from one scattered settlement to another, 
but of those who lived 20 miles fiom navigable water it was only the 
favored or the adventurous few who had ever visited any State except 
their own. 

To such a people there could be nothing startling in the ac(piisition 
of foreign territory. It could hardly be more foreign than much that 
was already within the Union. It could hardly be more distant, for a 
voyage from Philadelphia to London or Marseilles took less time and 
money and involved less risk and hardship than a trip to Cincinnati or 
Natchez. 

Gouverneur Morris said at the time of the Louisiana purchase that he 
had known since the day when the Constitution was adopted that all 
North America must at length be annexed, J 

At the close of the Revolutionary war both England and America 
regarded the long frontier on the north of the United States as not 
unlikely to be soon the scene of renewed hostilities. John Adams, in 
October, 1785, writes from abroad to the Secretary of State that some 
of the opposition in Great Britain were saying "that Canada and Nova 
Scotia must soon be ours; there must be a war for it; they know how 
it will end, but the sooner the better; this done, we shall be forever at 
peace; till then, never." § 

But we had a boundary still more difficult to the southward. The 
end of the Seven Years' War in Europe had seen France cede to Spain 
New Orleans, with so much cf her Louisiana territory as lay west of 
the Mississippi, and the rest to Great Britain. A cession from Spain 
of her claims on the Floridas had confirmed these as English posses- 
sions and made the Mississippi their western boundary; but during 
our Revolutionary war Spain had recaptured them and her title was 
confirmed by the peace of 1783. 

In 1800 Spain ceded back her Louisiana territories to France, and 
the century opened with Spain bounding us below Georgia and France 
hemming us in at the mouth of the Mississippi, and by an undefined, 

* 4, Elliot's Debates, 223, 4. t Writings, iil, 185. 

t Ibid. ,231. ^ Works, VIII, 333. 



(I POLICY OF THE UNITED STATES AS TO ANNEXATION. 

aud perhaps indefinable, stretch of territory running from the Gulf up 
toward the Canadian line. 

The leaders of the Kevolutiouary period who survived were united 
in the belief that it was vital to our interests to acquire the French 
title. Hamilton,* John x\danis,t and Gouverueur Morrist were of this 
Hiiud, not less than Jefferson, Madison, and Livingston. 

There was a serious question as to our right to make the purchase, 
and the Administration represented the party which regarded the Gov- 
ernment as one of delegated powers to be strictly construed. The 
great leader of the other school, Daniel Webster, declared, in 1837, 
during tlie heat of the controversy over the admission of Texas, that 
he did not believe the framers of the Constitution contemplated the 
annexation of for.'ign territory, and that, for his part, he believed it to 
be for the interest of the Union '-to remain as it is, without diminution 
and without addition."^ 

We now have, however, more light as to the real intention of the 
founders from the published letters of Gou verneur jNIorris, whose pen put 
the Constitution in form. No "decree de crescendo impcrio was inserted 
in it," he wrote, at the time of the Louisiana purchase, because no 
boundaries could be wisely or safely assigned to our tuture expansion. 
"I knew as well then as I do now that all North America must at length 
be annexed to us— hapuy, indeed, if the lust of possession stop there." || 

If, on the other hand, it had been intended to keep the Union forever 
within the limits then existing, we may be sure that an express jn'o- 
hibition would have been inserted. This was Gallatin's view when 
Jefferson consulted his Cabinet as to the Louisiana negotiation. The 
adverse position, he wrote the President, must be that " the United 
States are precluded from and renounce altogetlier the enlargement 
of territory— a ])iovision sufliciently imi)ortant and singular to have 
deserved to be expressly inserted." Jefferson's reply to this letter 
shows his own opinion more fully than it is elsewhere given in his cor 
respondence. "There is," he wrote, "no constitutional ditticulty as to 
the acquisition of territory, and whether, when accjuired, it may be 
taken into the Union by the Constitntion as it now stands will become 
a question of expediency."^] 

It was a time, moreover, tor action rather than for deliberation. 

Between a question of constitutional construction on the one hand, 
aud on the other a possiVde French army umler a Napoleon ascending 
the Mississii)pi to reconipier a New World, the administration was not 
disposed to hesitate as to the choice. Jetferson made the purchase, 
and the people ap])roved the act. Never was fifteen millions of xVmeri- 
can money better spent. 

The next op])ortunity to add to our possessions came in ISll), when 
we bought the Floridas of S]>ain, or at least a release of her title and 
pretensions to them; and the Supreme Court of the United States, 
being soon afterwards called upon to say what relation we bore to the 
new ac(pTisition, held, to the surprise of some of the strict construc- 
tionists among our i)ublic men, tlsat the right of the United States to 
wage war and to make treaties necessarily imiHied the light to ac<iuire 
new territorv, whether by con(iuest or purchase. This decision came 
from the lips of our greatest Chief Justice, John Marshall, and has 
been repeatedly reaftirmed by his successors on the bench.** 



* Works, III, 402. il Diary and Works, ii, 442. 

t Life and Works, ix, 631. H Uallatins Writings, i, 114. 

; Writinos, in, 185. ^ Works, i, 357. 

'* Mormon Churcli r. I'nited States, 136 U. S. Kep.. 1, 42. 



POLICY OF THE UNITED STATES AS TO ANNEXATION. 7 

Neither the Louisiana nor tlie Florida purchase had presented the 
question of the absorption of a foreign sovereignty. North Carolina 
and Rhode Island had tiually acceded to the Union, not in such a char- 
acter, but as having been members with the other States of a perpetual 
confederation, for which there had been substituted a new form of 
government. 

In 1830, however, came an application by the Republic of Texas for 
admission into the Union as a new and equal State. 

The dominant population there had alwaj-s been composed of immi- 
grants' from the United States. John (^uincy Adams, when President, 
had endeavored to buy it from Mexico,* and similar propositions from 
l*resident Jackson had also been made without success! In 1836 
Texas claime<l to have achieved her independence, and sent commis- 
sioners to Washington to negotiate a treaty of annexation. ]\Iexico 
regarded her still as one of her provinces, and the United States. 
delayed recognition of the new government until it should have proved 
its ability to defend its own existence. This was deemed sufliciently 
established after a year or two. and we, as well as the leading Euro})ean 
powers, maintained diplomatic relations with Texas for several years 
wliile tiie (luestiou of annexation was pending. 

The opi)osition to annexation was now led by John Quincy Adams, 
who introduced into the House of Representatives, in 1838, this 
resolution : 

Henolred, Tliat the power of annexing:: the ])eople of any iiidepeiideiit foreign State 
to tliis Union is a power not delegated by tbe (Constitution of tlic; United States to 
their Congress, or to any Department of their Government, but reserved by the 
people. That any attempt by act of Congress or by treaty would be a usurpation 
of power, uulawftil. and void, and which it would be the right and the duty of the 
free people of the Union to resist and aunnl. 

If, he said, Texas is annexed, it would be such a violation of our 
national compact as "not only inevitably to result in a dissolution of 
the Union, but fully to justify it; and we not only assert that the peo- 
ple of the free States ought not to submit to it, but we say with 
contidence that they wouhl not submit to it." 

On the other hand, many of the Southern leaders announced that if 
Texas were not annexed, and thus an opi)ortunity offered for the exten- 
sion of slavery, there would be a dissolution of the Union by the act 
of the South. 

Earlj" in 1844 a treaty of annexation was concluded, but the Senate 
rejected it by a vote of more than two to one. The admission of Texas 
was nmde the main issue in the Presidential election of the year. The 
Democratic party favored it in their platform, and won a decisive victory. 
President Tyler, thereupon, in his message to Congress at its December 
session, recommended that the verdict of the people be ratitied by an 
actof_anneMti()n. which should adopt and make into law the terms of 
"agreement already agreed on by the two (iovernments. 

A compromise bill was passed by which the consent of Congress was 
given to the erection of 'J'exas into a new State of the United States, 
but the President was authorized, should he deem it better to accom- 
plish the same purpose by a treaty, to jjroceed in that manner. Presi- 
dent Tyler promptly approved the act, and believing that any treaty 
he might negotiate would fail in the Senate, proceeded under the legis- 
lative clause, and on the last day of his term of ottice hurried off an 
envoy to Texas to obtain the consent of that Republic, which was soon 



* In 1827. Diary vii, 239. 

t .lackson ottered $.5,000,000 for it in 183.". 



8 POLICY OF THE UNITED STATES AS TO ANNEXATION. 

given, and Texas, therefore, came into the Union in 1845, not by treaty, 
but by virtue of a statute of the United States supported by siuiilar 
legislation of lier own. 

It is obvious that tliis mode of admitting a new State trenched directly 
on tlie importance of the States, in so far as they can be regarded as 
constituents of the Federal (Jovernment. Treaty making was c(nilided 
by the Constitution exclusively to the President and Senate, while the 
composition of the Senate was made such as not only to secure, upon 
every (juestion of that nature, an eciual voice to each State, but to 
guaranty a minority of the States against being overborne by anything 
less than two-thirds of all. The Texas precedent gave the popular 
branch equal powers as to the adnussion of a foreign State, and made 
the votes of a bare majority of the upper House sufhcient. 

From a very early i)eriod Cuba has been regarded by leading Southern 
.statesmen as%i desirable acquisition for us. In 1801) .Tetfer son wrote 
"in regard to this to President Madison that '-it will be objected to our 
receiving Cuba that no limit can then be drawn to our future acquisi- 
tions. Cuba can be defended by us without a navy; and this develops 
the principle which ought to limit our views. Nothing should ever be 
accepted which would recjuire a navy to defend it."* 

A few years later John (,)uincy Adams, as Secretary of State, in his 
instructions to our minister to Spain, wrote that Cuba and Porto Kico 
were natural appendages to our continent, and Cuba had become "an 
object of transcendent importance to the commercial and ])olitical inter- 
ests of our Union. Its commanding position, with reference to the Gulf 
of Mexico and the West India seas; the character of its i)opulation; 
its situation midway between our Southern coast and the island of San 
I)on)ingo; its sale and capacious harbor of the Havana, fronting a long 
line of our shores destitute of the same advantage: the nature of its 
productions and of its wants, furnishing the su])plies and needing the 
returns of a commerce immensely proti table and mutually beneticial, 
give it an importance in the sum of our national interests with which 
that of no other foreign territory can be compared, and little inferior to 
that which binds the different members of this Union together. Such, 
indeed, are, between the interests of that island and of this country, 
the geographical, commercial, moral, and political relations formed by 
nature,"gathering in the process of time, and even now verging to 
maturity, that in looking forwaid to the ])robable course of events for 
the short period of half a century, it is scarcely possible to resist the 
conviction that the annexation of Cuba to our Federal Pe|)ublic will be 
indispensable to the continuance and integrity of the Union itself. It 
is obvious, liowever, that for this event we are not yet iue])ared. Numer- 
ous and formidable Objections to the extension of our territoiial domin- 
ions beyond the sea present themselves to the lirst contemplation of 
the subject; obstacles to the system of policy by which alone that result 
can be compassed and maintained, are to be foreseen and surmounted, 
both at home ami abroad; but there are laws of political as well as of 
physical gravitation; and if au apple, severed by the tempest from its 
native tree, (;au not choose but fall to the ground, Cuba, forcibly dis- 
joined from its own unnatural connection with Spain, and incapable of 
'self-sui)port, can gravitate only towaids the North American Union, 
wldch, by the same law of nature, can not cast her off from its bosom."* 

The immediate object in view was to prevent Great Britain from 
acquiring Cuba. Jefferson wrote to President Monroe at about the 

' See also John Quiucy Adams's Diary, v, 38. 
tl, Wharton's Dig. of Int. Law, 361. 



POLICY OF THE UNITED STATES AS TO ANNEXATION. 9 

same time (1.S23) that should Great Britain take it he woukl not be for 
goiug to war for it, " because the first war on other accounts will give 
it to us, or the island will give itself to us when able to do so.-' "If 
we could get it peaceably," he said, "it would All up the measure of 
our well being." 

President Polk tried to buy it from Spain, and a hundred millions is (^^ 
said to have been the sum offered. 

In 1852 Great Britain and France proposed to us the formation 
of a tripartite agreement, by which each power disclaimed forever 
any intention to obtain possession of tlie island, and all undertook to 
discountenance any attem])ts to acquire it on the part of any other 
government. President Fillmore declined the overture, but in referring 
to it in his annual message, said that were Cuba "comparatively desti- 
tute of inhabitants or occupied by a kindred race, I should regard it, 
if voluntarily ceded by Spain, as a most desirable ac([uisition. But 
under existing circumstances, I should look upon its incorporation into 
our Union as a very hazardous measure. It would bring into the 
Confederacy a population of a different national stock, speaking a dif- 
ferent language, and not likely to harmonize with the other members." 

President Fillmore had, however, proposed and entered into a some- 
what similar convention two years before with Great Britain, with 
reference to Central America. 

By this it was covenanted that neither would ever occupy, colonize, 
or assume any dominion over any part of Central America. Mr. Buch- 
anan, while our minister to England in 1854, in alluding to this 
Clayton-Bulwer convention of April 19, 1850, in a communicaiion to the 
liritish foreign department, used this language: 

Both parties adoptotl tJiis self-denying ordinance for the purpose of teuuiniitiug 
serious naisunderstandiugsthen existing 1)et\veen them, which might have endangered, 
their friendly rehitions. ^Vht-ther the United States acted wisely or not in relin- 
([uishing their right as an independent nation to acquire territory in a region on their 
own continent which may become necessary for the security of their communication 
with their important and valualilc i)ossessions on the Pacific, is another and a differ- 
ent (]uestion. ISnt they have concluded the convention; their faith is pledged, and 
under such circumstances they never look behind the record. 

The treaty of 1848, which closed the Mexican war, had given us on 
l>ayment of •$15,(100,000, New Mexico and California, and in 1853 
another cession from Mexico — the "Gadsden purchase" — added south- 
ern Arizona at a cost of 810,000,000 more. These new possessions turned 
public attention to the necessity of a canal across tlie Isthmus of Pan- 
ama, and it was in tlie negotiations with reference to the status of such 
a canal that the covenant just mentioned in the Clayton-Bulwer con- 
vention was proposed by our Government and accepted by Great Britain. 
But the prospects of such a canal made the command of the entrance 
to the Gulf of Mexico doubly important to us, and gave a new color to 
our diplomacy regarding Cuba. Edward Everett, in one of his com- 
munications to the British minister, when Secretary of State, in 1852, 
said that " territorially and commercially it would in our hands be an 
extremely valuable possession. Under certain contingencies it might 
be almost essential to our safety." 

The Ostend manifesto of 1854 emphasized these considerations, kud 
intimated quite strongly that if a peaceful cession could not be accom- 
plished, a conquest might be dictated by the law of self preservation. 

President Buchanan devoted three pages of his second annual message, 
in 1858, to the Cuban question, referring to the fact that former ad- 
ministrations had repeatedly endeavored to purchase the island. The 
increasing trade of the Mississippi Valley, he said, and the position of 



/ 



10 POLICY OF THE UNITED STATES AS TO ANNEXATION. 

Cuba as commaiidino- the mouth of the river rendered its possession 
"of vast importance to the Ignited States," and, trusting in the efficacy 
of ready money, he recommended an appropriation by Congress to enable 
him to make an advance to Spain, should he be able to negotiate a 
cession immediately on the signature of the treaty, and before its 
ratitication by the Senate. A bill appro])riating $30,()(K),00() was tliere- 
upon introduced in the House and favorably reported, but no further 
progress was made. In his messages of 1859 and 18(K) the President 
repeated his recommendationsof a purchase, urging that it would secure 
the immediate abolition of the slave trade: but the forces that were 
working toward something greater, the abolition of slavery, were such 
as to render any serious consideration of the Cuban question now 
impossible. 

An act i>assed under the Buchanan Administration, which is still on 
tlie statute books, Kevised Statutes, Title i.xxii, explicitly affirms the 
power of the Uuited States to acquire foreign territory by right of dis- 
covery, and is also of importance as one of the few laws by which large 
powers not belonging strictly to the Executive function, have been 
])la('ed by Congress in the hands of the President. 

This statute i)rovides that whenever any of our citizens discovers and 
takes possession of any guano deposits on any island, rock, or key, which 
does not belong to any other government, "such island, rock, or key may, 
at the discretion of the President, be considered as apj^ertaining to the 
United States." All laws as to crimes and offences committed on the 
high seas are extended over such places. Trade in the guano is to be 
regulated as is our ordinary coasting trade. The United States shall 
not be obliged to retain possession of such places after the guano has 
been removed. The island of Navassa, some li miles hmg, lying between 
San Domingo and Jamaica, discovered in 1857, is now a part of the 
Uuited States under this act of 1851!. Not long ago there were 150 
persons living on it, all engaged in the renu^val of the guano. One of 
them killed another and was i)rom])tly punislied by the courts of the 
United States.* 

Under President Lincoln's Administration the country had enough to 
think of in trying to preserve its territory, without endeavoring to 
enlarge it. He did, however, recommend to Congress, in 18(11, the con- 
sideration of a colonization scheme, by which the freedmen of the South, 
and such of our free colored population as should desire it, might be 
transported to some foreign land, where, in a clin)ate congenial to them, 
they might build up a new comnninity. To carry out this plan "may," 
he said, "involve the acquiring of territory and also the a])propriation 
of money beyond thatto beex])ended in the territorial acquisition. Hav- 
ing practiced the ac(iuisition of territory for nearly sixty years, the 
question of constitutional power to do so is no longer an oi)en one with 
us. * * * Oi, this whole ])r()p()sition, including the appropriation 
of money with the acquisition of territory, does not the expediency 
amount to absolute necessity — that without which the Government 
itself can not be perpetuated t" 

When, a year later, slavery was abolished in the District of Columbia, 
$ 5()0,0()(> was appropriated to aid in colonizing such of the freedmen as 
might wish to emigrate, in Hayti or Liberia. A few Avere aided to leave 
the country in this way, most of whom were taken by the (Jovernment 
to lie a Vache, off the coast of New Granada, and the rest to Liberia. 

Alaska was bought of Kussia, by treaty, in 18(»7, for $7,L>0(),()00. The 
Houvse of Representatives insisted for a time on the necessity of an act 

* Jones vs. United States, 137 U. S. Rep. 



POLICY OF THE UNITED STATES AS TO ANNEXATION. 11 

of Congress to legalize the purchase, but the Senate refused to coucur 
in this view, and the point was finally yielded. By this acquisition we 
came into possession, not only of a part of the continent remote from 
our own, but of distant islands, some of them over 2,000 miles froni 
the nearest point of seacoast previously within our Jurisdiction, The 
test of contiguity, as determining the right of annexation, was now, 
therefore, finally and deliberately abandoned. It was abandoned also 
with ahnost unanimous acquiescence, since there were but two votes in 
the Senate against the ratitication of tlie treaty. 

Had President Jackson had his way, a similar position would proba- 
bly have been taken by our Government thirty years before, for, in_l§o5^ 
he authorized our minister to Mexico to offer her half a million dollars 
for a cession of the bay of San Francisco and the adjacent shore.* 

In the same year which witnessed the purchase of Alaska, Mr. Seward, 
as Secretary of State, also negotiated a treaty with Denmark for the 
cession of the West India Islands of St. Thomas and St. John, on our 
paying her $7,r)00,000 for them. President Johnson, in his annual mes- 
sage for 18(J7, thus alludes to their proposed annexation: 

In our Revolutionary war, ports and harbors in the West India Islan<ls were used 
by our enomy, to the yreat injury and embarrassment of tiie I'nited States. We had 
tlie same experience in our second war with (ireat Hritain. The same l^nropean 
policy lor a long time excluded us even from trade with the West Indies, while we 
were at peace with all nations. In our recent civil war the rebels, and their piratical 
and blockade-breaking allies, found facilities in the same jjorts for the work, which 
they too successfully accomplished, of injuring and devastating the commerce which 
we are now engaged in rebuilding. We labored especially under this disadvantage 
that European steam vessels, cniidoyed by our enemies, found irieudly shelter, pro- 
tection, and supplies in West Indian ports, while our naval operations were necessa- 
rily carried on Irom our own distant shores. There was then a universal fe(ding of 
the want of an advanced naval outpost between the Atlantic coast and Europe. The 
duty of obtaining such an outpost peacefully and lawfully, while neitlier doing nor 
menacing injury to other States, earnestly engaged the attention of the Executive 
Department before the close of the war, and it has.not been lost sight of since that 
time. A not entirely dissimilar naval want revealed itself during the same period 
on the Pacific coast. The recpiired foothold there was fortunately secured l)y our 
late Treaty with the Emjteror of Kussia. and it now seems imperative that the'more 
obvious necessities of the Atlantic coast should not be less carefully provided for. 
A good and convenient port and harlior, capable of easy defence, will sup]dy that 
want. With the iiossession of such a station by the Pnited States, neither we I'or 
any other American nation need Linger appiehend injury or otilense from any trans- 
atlantic enemy. I agree with our early st;itesmeu that the West Indies naturally 
gravitate to, and may be expected ultimately to be absorbed by, the Continental 
States, including our own. I agree with them also that it is wise to leave the (|ues- 
tion of such absorption to this process of natural political gravitation. The islands 
of St. Thomas and St. Johns, which constitute n part of the grou]) called the Virgin 
Islands, seemed to offer us advantages immediately desirable, while their ac(|uisition 
could be secured in harmony with the principles to which I have alluded. 

At this time tlie relations of President Johnson to tlie Senate were 
anything but harmonious, and mainly from this cause, I think, the 
treaty was rejected in 186S, although the inhabitants of both islands 
had already voted in favor of annexation. 

Shortly after Gen. Grant's accession to the Presidency he concluded 
the negotiations with the Dominican Pepublic, begun by Secretary 
Seward at the close of the preceding Adntinistration,t of a treaty of 
annexation of so much of the island of San Domingo as was not included 
within the limits of Hayti. As in the case of Texas, two independent 
sovereignties thus contracted for the absorption of one into the other, 
but unlike Texas, San Domingo was not to enter the ITnion as one of 
the States that compose it. The treaty was rejected by a tie vote in 



* 1, Wharton: International Law Digest, 557. 
t Seward's Works, v, 29. 



12 POLICY OF THE UNITED STATES AS TO ANNEXATION. 

the Senate. In his next messaj;e to Coiij»ress tlie President earnestly 
re(;oinmeude(l lej^islative action in the same direction. 

"The acfinisition of San Domingo," he said, -'is desirable becanse of 
its geograi)hical position." * * * u^^ present onr coast trade 
between the States bordering on the Atlantic and those bordering on 
the Gnlf of Mexico is cut into by the Bahannis and the Antilles, Twice 
we mast, as it were, pass through foreign countries to get by se;i from 
Georgia to the west coast of Florida." * * * "The acquisition of 
San J)omingo is an adherence to the ' .Monroe doctrine;' it is a measure 
of natural protection; it is asserting our Just claim to a controlling 
influence over the great commercial traffic soon to tlow Irom west to east 
by way of the Isthmus of Darien." 

Congress responded to these appeals by sending an able commission, 
Senator Wade, President Andrew D. White, and Dr. Samuel G. Howe, 
of Boston, to visit San Domingo. TMiey reported in favor of its annex- 
ation, but the project went no farther. 

The opposition to Cirant in this matter was started by Charles Sum- 
ner, then at the head of the Senate Committee on Foreign lielations, 
who seems to have been governed largely by his interest in the colored 
race.* To them, he believed, belonged ''the ecjuatorial belt." They had 
established a liepublic in llayti. If San Domingv* were annexed to the 
United States, Ilayti must inevitably decline, and there would be a new 
argument for those who denied tlie capacity of the negro for self- 
government. 

Down to the close of the reconstruction period, which followed the 
civil war, tliere was, indeed, no time alter the Louisiana i>urchnse when 
the (|uestion of the right and ])olicy of annexation, with respect to any 
foreign territory, was not determined by every public man largely in 
ac(;ordauce with his views of its bearing on the future of the Southern 
blacks. Grant, himself, was looking to San Domingo as the site of 
future States of our Cnion", ])eople(l and governed by colonies of our 
new class of freedmen. 

The American people, in the words of Henry Adams, began the cen- 
tury with the "ambition to use the entire continent for their experi- 
ments."' t 

Jefferson was their leader, and of all American ^statesmen he best 
understood and represented the popular sentiment of his day. What 
Lincoln was to the North, .Jefferson was to the country. But Jefferson 
had the larger, though U^ss l)alaiu'ed mind. He was an idealist and 
an optimist. With equal lights and oi)portunities to every citizen, 
and to every State, he feared no extension of territory for a Union rest- 
ing on community of interest and individual liberty. Jefferson never 
believed tiiat the prosperity of the South was de])endent on the insti- 
tution of slavery, but, for half a century, among his successors in the 
conduct of the Government, were many who did. Our policy as to 
annexation, therefore, soon became a sectional (jnestion, and so con- 
tinued until the Southern negro was given not only freedom, but the 
right of suffrage. 

President Grant's Administration, inl8J2^by an agreement between 
one of our naval officers and the chief of Tatuila, one of the Samoan 
Islands, obtained the exclusive pri\ ilegc of establishing a coaling sta- 
tion at the port of Pango I'ango, and President Hayes took possession 
of the privilege ceded, in 1870. 

The arts of civilization were introduced into the Sandwich Islands by 



* Memoir and Letters, iv, 448. 

t History of the United States, ii, 301. 



POLICY OF THE UNITED S^^ATES AS TO ANNEXATION. 13 

Auiericau missionaries in tlie first quarter of this century, and their 
trade has always been largely with tliis country. They lie 300 miles 
nearer San Francisco than the outermost of the Aleutian Islands, which 
came to us as a part of the Alaska purchase. In 1843 an English offi- I & n 
cer, without authority, took possession of Hawaii in behalf of the Queen, ^ 
but this action was promptly disavowed by his (Government. Our Sec- 
retary of State, Mr. Legare, wrote ujjon this event to our minister to 
England that these islands bore sucli peculiar relations to ns tliat we 
might feel justified in interfering by force to prevent their conipiest by 
any of the great poweis of Euroj)e.* (Ireat Britain and France, how- 
ever, allayed any ill-feeling on the i)art of our Government by a con- ^ 
vention made during this year l)y whicli each covenanted never to take "l 
a cession of the islands or assume a i)rotectorate over them. ( 

In 18;");^ Mr. Marcy, as Secretary of State, in instructions to our min- 
ister to France, wrote of them thus: "Jt seems to be inevitable that 
they must come undei- the control of this (jov^rnment." Two years later 
he informed our minister to Hawaii that we would leceive the transfer 
of the territorial sovereignty of the islands. In 1808 the subject was 
again brought up, but Secretary Seward, fresh from his disappoint- 
ments with reference to the Danish \^■est Imlies. wrote our ininister 
that the time was unfavorable for the consideration of annexation prop- 
ositions by the Tnited States. 

By the treaty of reciprocity, in 1875, the two countries were drawn 
closer together, and the commerce between theimvas soon doubled. 

Early in the present year a treaty of annexation was laid before the 
Senate, but withdrawn on the accession of the new Administration. In 
his message accompanying the treaty President Harrison said that the 
deposition of the Queen had left but two courses open to the United 
States, the assumption of a protectorate or annexation. 

The views of the present Administration maybe inferred from Presi- 
dent Cleveland's first message, in 1884, in which he said: "I do not || f 
favor a policy of acquisition of new and distant territory, or the incor- 
poration of remote interests with our own." 

The annexation of Canada, so ardently desired by Franklin and all 
the statesmen of the Revolution, has never since that period been made 
a subject of formal diplomatic discussion. Its growth in wealth and 
population and its fedeiation into a great dominion of many provinces 
are evidently paving the way to independence. When that time comes 

annexation will follow. . — -^ — -^ — - ^ _- .^ -, I 

""Her institutions are every year becoming better fitted to coalesce with 
ours, as her provinces, .each with a life and history of its own, partici- 
pate by their representatives in general legislation\at a common capital 
under an executive who, during his term of olBce, is more secure in his 
position than the prime minister of Great Britain and little less sub- 
ject to the pleasure of tlie sovereign. 

The French Canadians are of a different race and tongue and religion 
from that of most of the Americans of the Revolutionary era. But if 
they were not afraid to admit them to citizenship of the United States 
in the eighteenth century, surely we need not be when the time comes, 
in the twentieth. The Americans of to-day are a composite race, and 
universal religious toleration has made us sensible that men's religious 
beliefs are dangerous to the community only when they are forced to 
conceal or suppress them. The Roman Church has frankly accepted 
the right of every ])eople to such form of government as they may choose 
for themselves, and the million of Catholics in Canada would be no 

* 1, Wharton : International Law Digest, 418. 



J 



14 POLICY OF THE UNITED STATES AS TO ANNEXATION. 

more, as such, a factor in American politics than the million of Catho- 
lics who are today inhabitants of New York, or the more than a mil- 
lion who are citizens of New England. 

The (liferent provinces of Canada are so situated with respect to each 
other and the natural boundaries of separation between most of them 
arc .such that their trade gravitates southward to the United States in 
seeking its center of distribution. What it has to sell it can sell best 
to us. What it needs to buy it finds best here. 

The immense area which the Dominion of Canada now includes is 
beyond the powers of any mere colony or group of colonies to bring 
under the full influences of civilization. As fast as it approaches that 
end, so fast it also approaches the necessity of independence of Crreat 
Britain. 

It is probable that Great Britain would make little objection to the 
.severance from her possessions of so costly and unremunerative a 
dependence. Before the negotiation of the treaty of Washington our 
Secretary of State, Mr. Fish, in conversation with Sir Edward Thorn- 
ton, the British minister, said that our AlaJxima claims were too large 
to be settled in money and intimated that a cession of Canada might be 
accepted as a satisfactory adjustment. The reply was that England did 
not wish to keep Canada, but could not part with it without the consent 
of its population.* 

The original area of the United States, before the Louisiana purchase, 
was, perhaps, a million of square miles. t That acquisition and the 
subsequent cession of the Floridas much more than doubled our terri- 
tory. Texas then came to us with 300,000 square miles, and Mexico, in 
1848 and 1.S53, ceded a somewhat greater number. In Alaska we 
received, in 1807, an addition of over half a ndllion, and thus our total 
area now is a little more than 3,500,000 square miles. 

Canada and Newfoundland cover about the same extent of territorj^ 
or over 3,524,000 sijuare miles, estimating for part of lUitish Columbia 
not yet accurately surveyed. 

At the time of the Revolution the latest authority on American 
geography was the American Gazetteer, published in London in 1770. 
It gave the total area of the North American Continent, with a pre- 
cision not aimed at by modern statisticians, at 3, ODD, 087 sijuare miles. 
The founders of the United States did not dream that the narrow line 
of States they had drawn together could in a century come to include 
a territory of .:),500,000 square miles, and still have beyond them another 
area of eipuil magnitude, aiul much of it of etjual fertility and natural 
resources, into which to expand in the next century. But that exi)an- 
sion, I believe, it is our destiny to accomplish, and by no other means 
than those of peace and mutual good will. The good faith of the nation 
was pledged by the Clayton- IJulwer treaty against further extension to 
the southward, though it is doubtful whether this is still binding upon 
us;i but the North American Continent, with every island on the east 
and the Hawaiian group upon the west, all bound to it as satellites to 
their planet, will, if we continue in our historic policy as to annexation, 
eventually come under the flag of the United States. 

It has been argued with great force by an eminent authority on Amer- 
ican constitutional law,§ that our plan of government makes no provi- 

*M»iiioir and Letters of ("hailcs Suiuiier, iv, l()!t. 

tThis is the e.'^tiinatt' jjivcn in Morse's American Geography, published in 1792. 
tSee Report of Senate Committee on Foreign Kelations of December 22, 1892, on 
Senate bill No. 1218. 

^ Judge Cooley in the Forum for June, 1893, Vol. XV, p. 393. 



POLICY OF THE UNITED STATES AS TO ANNEXATION. 15 

siou for a colonial system. But the relatious of an extraterritorial 
possession to the rnited States can never be tliose of a colony to a 
European i)ower. Such a colony has generally been treated as an 
appanage held for the benetit of the comuiercial interests of the mother 
country. Its trade, conducted by others and for others, has brought 
little benefit to its own inhabitants, to whom the navigation laws 
imposed upon them by a distant power have often seemed a kind of 
spoliation under the name of protection. 

But any possessions, separated from the continent, which the United 
States may acquire, can rely on being governed under some system 
devised for the interest of all concerned, and administered by their 
own inhabitants, so far as they may show a capacity for self-government. 

Kor yet need we fear that the United States would not, if the 
occasion demanded, rule with a strong hand, when we recall the almost 
despotic system of administration which, under the Administration of 
Jefferson, was forced upon the unwilling inhabitants of the Louisiana 
and Orleans territories, and maintained until they had learned the real 
qualities and conditions of American citizenship. 

Up to the present time the cost of such of our territory as has come 
to us by purchase has been, in all, as follows : 

1803, Louisiana 1 .$15, 000,000 

1819, I'lorida 5, 000, 000 

1848, Calilbrnia and New :Mexico 15. 000, 000 

1853, Arizona 10, 000, 000 

1867, Alaska 7. 200, 000 

Total 52, 200, 000 

It has been cheajjly bought, even if we add to these sums the espendi- 
dures in the Seminole war, which followed the Florida purchase, and of 
the Mexican war, which had so close a connection with those which came 
next. 

The greatest lawsuit in the M'orld is now on trial at Paris, brought 
to define our rights as owner of the remotest of these acquisitions, a 
little island in the Pacific, farther than is Hawaii from San Francisco. 
It is a pleasant sign of the times that this controversy arises mainly from 
a humane sentiment towards the brute creation, and is to be decided 
precisely as any question between good neighbors might be, by a friendly 
arbitrament. 

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